Monday, January 07, 2008

Real squirrels do eat quiche

We have acquired a squirrel.

This audacious, gluttonous rodent waltzed boldly onto our property two weeks ago, and has set up shop like some crazy distant relative, prancing around like he owns the place. Last week, I saw him scoffing down a cinnamon raisin cookie on our front porch. Friday, there was a nibbled slice of quiche on the upper back porch railing (where does a squirrel get quiche???). And this morning, I found the wrapper and a few remaining pieces of a McDonald's breakfast sandwich outside of our front door. Unbelievable.

THAT DOG is beside herself. She keeps running at the kitchen window in unrestrained fury, howling at this interloper, only to have the squirrel stare back at her unfazed, as if to say, "What? You want a piece of me?" He has a point. THAT DOG might outweigh him by a pound or two, but in paw-to-paw combat, my beloved pup would be cowering in the corner. She's a lover, not a fighter.

All this leaves me wondering why squirrels exist at all--Do they eat mosquitoes or keep down the rat population? Does their breath somehow cleanse toxins from the environment? This one, at least, doesn't seem to have much in the way of redeeming qualities. He's lucky he's a city squirrel; where I come from folks keep BB guns in the kitchen for just this kind of encounter. Not that I know how to shoot a BB gun or anything, but it sure is fun to think about when I'm cleaning up his leftover quiche.

Ah, squirrels. I have had a run in with those buggers not once but twice and INSIDE both times. The first one was a dead and rotted version of a squirrel pinned under a box of china in my parent's house. I immediately noted I'd be using paper plates. The second time was when one plopped down their chimney and went nutso tearing the house apart. Who doesn't want a rabbies foaming squirrel scraping up the wood floors?

I don't know their purpose either, but they sure are resourceful little buggers! They need to watch out in my neighborhood, too. My neighbor watches from his living room - if a squirrel so much as steps a foot onto his lawn, he runs out of his house, yelling, "Get away, vermin!" He has also been known to use explosives. Poor THAT DOG. But it probably gives her some excitement in this dreary part of the winter! :-)

Sounds like some of your neighbors need to secure their garbage cans a bit more gooderishly.

I have always loved squirrels. Back in my days of hating all humanity (ie - when I rode the T and walked on the crowded downtown sidewalks), I had a regular exercise of thanking God for 10 things. Some days, that was hard. I recall often thanking God for the fluffy tails of squirrels. They make me smile. I mean, if you can just pretend you don't know about the little critters that live within that fluffy tail fur, they're very cute.

But then again, I have always felt like city critters get a bum wrap. How dare they try to survive on sidewalks that we paved over and dotted with giant metal & glass buildings. The little jerks!

I had one blow up our transformer a couple of years ago. Yeah, I heard this LOUD bang and then all the power went out. I thought the whole block blew up. While on the phone with the electric company, I went outside to investigate if neighbors had power and that's when I saw "the smoking squirrel".

Poor critter wasn't going to make it home for dinner that day. He had been walking the power line and something that should have had a cover on it, didn't, and that was the end of that guy -- instant squirrel sear.